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enTeachers should use their power over tests to uncage learninghttp://www.altamontenterprise.com/opinion/editorials/guilderland/09042014/teachers-should-use-their-power-over-tests-uncage-learning
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</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>Today, children in our area return to school. The anticipation of seeing old friends and learning new things has been quelled in recent years by the specter of too many tests.</p>
<p>We devoted our Back-To-School edition last week to the Common Core, documenting the way it is playing out in our local school districts.</p>
<p>While many educators see the standards as valuable, a recent Phi Delta Kappa Gallup poll found widespread dislike across America for the Common Core — a set of educational standards developed by the National Governors Association and adopted by most states. Whereas last year, 62 percent had never heard of the Common Core, this year, 81 percent knew something of it and the majority opposed requiring teachers to use the standards to guide their instruction.</p>
<p>Significantly, only a small percentage knew about the Common Core from their school district — the teachers and school leaders; for the vast majority, knowledge came from television, newspapers, and radio.</p>
<p>We’ve tried to do our part by interviewing local educators and reporting the reality of implementing the Common Core as they perceive it. We learned some things ourselves in the process.</p>
<p>Two years ago, on this page, we wrote that rhetoric is one thing and reality another. We wrote that the rhetoric from the State Education Department was about how the new system for evaluating teachers would advance the profession and improve student learning while the reality was children were crying at the start of the school year.</p>
<p>They were being tested to set up a baseline against which their progress would be measured at the end of the year. To qualify for federal Race to the Top funds, New York State agreed to have teachers evaluated, in part, by their students’ test scores. The teachers’ unions agreed to this. New York Education Law on annual reviews for principals and teachers requires now that 40 percent be based on student performance: 20 percent of that is from student growth data based on state assessments and 20 percent is on locally selected assessments.</p>
<p>“We did have some of the little kids cry,” the Voorheesville superintendent told us two years ago when the baseline tests were first given. “We also had a student ask a teacher why she couldn’t help, and we thought that was profound — giving these tests seemed to go against the role of a teacher, which is to help.”</p>
<p>We wrote that was, indeed, profound, that trust is a cornerstone, a foundation for learning. How awful for both the students and the teachers to have to endure this charade.</p>
<p>Now, this school year, the teachers at Guilderland have taken a brave and bold step. After using an outside testing company the first year, in 2012, and then developing district tests last year, the union has agreed to do away with the added layer of pre- and post-assessment tests that had been given to students in every elementary grade on top of the state tests.</p>
<p>The Guilderland Teachers’ Association has agreed to forego those tests entirely and use just the state-required tests. Erin McNamara, the new president of the GTA, told us the goal of the teachers’ union is to meet state mandates for teacher evaluation without “testing students to death.” The growth from one year to the next will apply equally to all teachers in a school.</p>
<p>Bravo!</p>
<p>This is a model other districts should follow if they value their students’ welfare.</p>
<p>McNamara notes there are risks, with outstanding teachers making a sacrifice. For example, a teacher who was rated “highly effective” — the top of four state-set categories — could fall into the lower category of “effective” if that is what the combined rating, based on state test scores, for the school building turned out to be.</p>
<p>Still, she said, just as there is an overall benefit for students having to take fewer tests, there is also a benefit for teachers. “Some of us were coming up with tests for the sake of coming up with tests,” she said. “It impacted our instructional time.”</p>
<p>Other benefits were outlined by Guilderland’s Assistant Superintendent for Instruction Demian Singleton who said, “Now the building is looking through a common lens. They are rowing the boat in the same direction, not worrying about the score of each individual teacher.”</p>
<p>This works well with the collaborative teaching model Guilderland is moving toward. The district is using an embedded coaching model at Lynnwood Elementary School, which hosts special-needs students from across the district. Two “literacy coaches” on the staff work regularly with classroom teachers. “It’s a constant conversation,” Singleton said, adding, “The staff as a whole embraced delving into student needs and being more diagnostic — not teaching to the middle but to individual needs.”</p>
<p>Guilderland will be working this year on developing a different assessment model, not the high-stakes kind of testing used by the state to measure one school’s success against another’s but, rather, a model that can inform classroom teachers about individual student needs.</p>
<p>Both Guilderland and Voorheesville are part of a 12-district consortium that received a $399,946 state “Teaching is the Core” grant to inform classroom instruction. Guilderland’s superintendent, Marie Wiles, told us that the assessments to be developed with the grant will serve “more as a coaching model.”</p>
<p>We believe tests have worth if they are used to see where a student has weaknesses, where a student needs help to succeed. These sorts of assessments can also help teachers know how to best group students to effectively teach them the skills they lack.</p>
<p>We’ve reviewed the Common Core standards and believe they are sound. The bulk of the problems have come from another reform, for teacher accountability, tying a teacher’s livelihood to high-stakes tests that make students suffer and do little to improve actual classroom teaching.</p>
<p>Even before New York caved in to the federal plan, too much emphasis was placed on high-stakes testing. Schools were already being judged by state-issued report cards, based on a compilation of test scores. This ignores a convincing body of research that shows students success — as measured, yes, by test scores but also by later life’s work — is most directly correlated to family background and expectations.</p>
<p>The recent Gallup poll found those Americans who opposed Common Core standards gave as the most important reason a belief it limited teachers’ flexibility to teach what is best. We believe Good teachers really do know what is best for their students. But it is not the Common Core that is limiting that.</p>
<p>The rigidity, the lack of flexibility, comes from the force to teach to the test. It is much easier for a teacher to get rote responses from students, working off a template of previous tests, than it is to truly challenge them with a rich curriculum, to shape young minds in a way that will make them resilient.</p>
<p>The Common Core stresses that very sort of critical reasoning skill. By removing at least two layers of yearly standardized testing, the Guilderland teachers have not only liberated their students, but themselves as well.</p>
<p>They can now spend their limited time and considerable talents on what really matters — educating their students.</p>
<p><em>— Melissa Hale-Spencer</em></p>
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</div><div class="field field-name-post-date field-type-ds field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Post date:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">September 4, 2014</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><h3 class="field-label">Tags: </h3><ul class="links inline"><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-0" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/education" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">education</a></li><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-1" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/guilderland-central-school-district" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Guilderland Central School District</a></li><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-2" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/gta" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">GTA</a></li><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-3" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/teachers" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">teachers</a></li><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-4" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/state-tests" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">state tests</a></li></ul></div><div class="easy_social_box clearfix vertical easy_social_lang_und">
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</div></div></div>Thu, 04 Sep 2014 21:16:24 +0000admin3900 at http://www.altamontenterprise.comLight a fire for learninghttp://www.altamontenterprise.com/opinion/editorials/regional/09122013/light-fire-learning
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</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p><em>“The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled.”</em></p>
<p>— Plutarch</p>
<p>Sometimes, of late, American educational leaders — or at least those purporting to be — are so focused on numbers that the essence of learning is forgotten.</p>
<p>New Yorkers are consumed with the numbers from test scores — numbers that are used to measure not only students’ progress but teachers’ worth.</p>
<p>Scores recently released on tests taken by students in third through eighth grades are down not because students suddenly became stupid — over half aren’t considered proficient in math or English — and not just because, as the education commissioner has asserted, that standards have been raised. Rather, the tests were given on materials that weren’t taught, and the exams aren’t constructed in a way that would accurately reflect the new Common Core Standards once they are taught.</p>
<p>Local school leaders are necessarily consumed with numbers, too — budget numbers. As state and federal aid has dwindled in recent years, health-care and pension costs have soared, property values have remained stagnant, and taxpayers feel strapped. All this has led to cuts, of school staff and of programs.</p>
<p>Often, the so-called “extras” are first on the chopping block. Depending on the district, this can range from sports to the arts.</p>
<p>So, we went back to school this week to be enlightened by the students. We visited Guilderland High School on Friday, the first day of class, to get away from the numbers. We listened in on a choral rehearsal in the early afternoon. Eighty students sat in rapt attention with two minutes to absorb a new piece of sheet music. No one was messing around.</p>
<p>“Pay attention to the rhythms,” said their teacher, Rae Jean Teeter, before they began singing “Peace, a Shaker song from the 1850s.”</p>
<p>“The faster you read it, the faster you internalize it,” said Leonard Bopp, a junior who leads the bass section, after the rehearsal. “Learning the notes and rhythm is only step one,” he told us. “After that, you’re not reading, you’re channeling — you let it out through your voice or your instrument,” said Bopp, who plays the trumpet and plans to pursue that in college.</p>
<p>We were at the school to write a story because the chorus has been invited to sing at Carnegie Hall, and needs money to get there. “It’s a chance to represent our school and community on one of the best stages in the world; it’s something our community can take pride in,” said Bopp.</p>
<p>“The fact that Guilderland High School gets the opportunity is amazing,” said Alanna Wilson, a senior who leads the altos. “So many kids want this but their school doesn’t have the – ” Her voice trailed off, as she searched for the word: “Ability?” “Privilege?” she asked.</p>
<p>“Privilege,” Bopp agreed.</p>
<p>As we talked to the students, what most impressed us, more than their musical abilities, was how they spoke about what they had learned from studying music; both have been in school choruses since they were in the fourth grade. </p>
<p>“It changes my mood a lot,” said Wilson of going to choir rehearsals. “I might be having a bad day, but I come to this room and my whole mood changes.” She feels uplifted.</p>
<p>“Music goes places where words can’t,” said Bopp.</p>
<p>“Mrs. Teeter encourages you to do all sorts of things out of your comfort zone, to take risks, to broaden your horizon,” said Wilson.</p>
<p>“Mrs. Teeter pushes us,” agreed Bopp. “It can inspire you to try new things in all aspects of your life.”</p>
<p>Standardized tests won’t measure these life lessons nor reflect the skill of the teacher imparting them.</p>
<p>Similar life lessons are taught on the playing field. Our sportswriter, Jordan J. Michael, this week has chronicled what many consider the worst part of school athletics — injuries. </p>
<p>“Kids think they’re untouchable, unbreakable, but they realize they aren’t,” said Kate Gawrys, the certified athletic trainer for Guilderland High School. That is certainly a difficult lesson to learn. But Gawrys goes on. “When they get injured,” she said, “they can’t see the end, but, with some goals, they can feel better.”</p>
<p>The struggles that Michael chronicles make us wince. What’s it like for the football team’s quarterback to break his leg in the very first game? “Someone took something special away from me,” said Joe Bender. “I worked so hard, and one play changed everything.”</p>
<p>But, after surgery, Bender didn’t quit the team. He still went to practices and games. “They were my brothers,” he said. And, he went on to excel at baseball.</p>
<p>Bender has some advice that would be good for any of us to follow: “You never know when the last play can happen, so always work your tail off. You should have no regrets when you’re doing anything.”</p>
<p>Tristan Wilson, while playing basketball for the Berne-Knox-Westerlo junior varsity team, broke his arm when he was knocked into trying to make a lay-up shot. “I’ve never seen anything like that,” said his coach, Andy Wright. “He came down and his arm snapped through the skin. It was like a war movie. His arm was shooting blood.”</p>
<p>A year later, with a rod in his arm, Wilson was playing on the varsity team. Why? “Mostly, it was Andy that gave me confidence,” he said of his coach. “He had my back the whole time. Coach Wright had confidence in me. He never scolded me.”</p>
<p>Jennifer Cillis, who played basketball for Voorheesville, tore a ligament in her knee but went on to play basketball again. Now a sophomore at Boston College, majoring in biology to become a doctor, she said, “My injury really solidified my interest in a medical career. I was so much better after surgery, I want to help to put people back together.”</p>
<p>The ability to learn and grow from the worst happenstance speaks volumes about resilience. Love of teammates, a coach’s backing, an ability to forge the future from past hurt — none of these can be measured by tests. All of them have come from a public-school education. We must be careful what we cut.</p>
<p>And we must be mindful of what Plutarch, the First-Century Greek scholar, wrote in the Moralia, when he expanded on the analogy that the mind is not a vessel that needs filling but, rather, like wood that needs igniting. “Suppose someone were to go and ask his neighbors for fire and find a substantial blaze there,” he wrote, “and just stay there continually warming himself: That is no different from someone who goes to someone else to get some of his rationality, and fails to realize that he ought to ignite his innate flame, his own intellect….”</p>
<p>True education — like Rae Jean Teeter’s inspiring her students to go beyond where they thought they could, or Andy Wright’s instilling confidence after a grievous wound — motivates one towards originality and sustains one for a lifetime. </p>
<p>— <em>Melissa Hale-Spencer</em></p>
</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-post-date field-type-ds field-label-inline clearfix"><div class="field-label">Post date:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">September 12, 2013</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-inline clearfix"><h3 class="field-label">Tags: </h3><ul class="links inline"><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-0" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/common-core" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">common core</a></li><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-1" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/state-tests" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">state tests</a></li><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-2" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/sports-injuries" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">sports injuries</a></li><li class="taxonomy-term-reference-3" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tags/carnegie-hall" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Carnegie Hall</a></li></ul></div><div class="easy_social_box clearfix vertical easy_social_lang_und">
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</div></div></div>Fri, 13 Sep 2013 00:13:14 +0000admin905 at http://www.altamontenterprise.com